Women's Agency and Rituals in Mixed and Female Masonic Orders

Women’s Agency and Rituals in Mixed and Female Masonic Orders Aries Book Series Texts and Studies in Western Esotericism Editor Wouter J. Hanegraaff Editorial Board Jean-Pierre Brach Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke Advisory Board Roland Edighoffer – Antoine Faivre Olav Hammer – Andreas Kilcher Arthur McCalla – Monika Neugebauer-Wölk Marco Pasi – Mark Sedgwick – Jan Snoek Michael Stausberg – Kocku von Stuckrad György Szo˝nyi – Garry Trompf VOLUME 8 Women’s Agency and Rituals in Mixed and Female Masonic Orders Edited by Alexandra Heidle Jan A.M. Snoek LEIDEN • BOSTON 2008 Cover illustration: Annie Besant in Adjar (see the article by Andrew Prescott). Picture by photo studio ‘Wiele & Klein’ in Madras (Courtesy Völkerkundemuseum of the Von Portheim-Stiftung in Heidelberg, Germany). This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Women’s agency and rituals in mixed and female Masonic orders / edited by Alexandra Heidle, Jan A.M. Snoek. p. cm. — (Aries book series; 8) Includes index. ISBN 978-90-04-17239-5 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Women and freemasonry. 2. Freemasonry—Rituals. I. Heidle, Alexandra. II. Snoek, Joannes Augustinus Maria, 1946- HS499.W65 2008 366’.10820973 2008035726 ISSN 1871-1405 ISBN 978 90 04 17239 5 Copyright 2008 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands CONTENTS Preface ............................................................................................... vii Abbreviations .................................................................................... xii List of Illustrations ........................................................................... xiii Addresses of the Editors and Authors ............................................... xv Introduction ......................................................................................... 1 Jan A.M. Snoek The Relationships of Androgynous Secret Orders with Freemasonry; Documents on the Ordre des Hermites de bonne humeur in Sachsen- Gotha (1739-1758) ............................................................................ 21 Bärbel Raschke The Grand Lodge of Adoption, La Loge de Juste, The Hague, 1751: A Short-lived Experiment in Mixed Freemasonry or a Victim of Elegant Exploitation? ..................................................................................... 51 Malcolm Davies Maçonnerie des Dames: The Plans of the Strict Observance to Estab- lish a Female Branch ......................................................................... 89 Andreas Önnerfors Freemason Feminists: Masonic Reform and the Women’s Movement in France, 1840-1914 ....................................................................... 219 James Smith Allen The ‘Women’s Question’. The Discussion, Especially in the Nine- teenth Century, About Opening Membership of the Dutch Grand Lodge to Women ............................................................................. 235 Anton van de Sande Women and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn: Nineteenth Century Occultist Initiation from a Gender Perspective …………. 245 Henrik Bogdan vi Stretton’s ‘Operative’ Masonry: Legacy or Forgery? ……............. 265 Bernard Dat Freemasonry and Suffrage: The Manifestation of Social Conscience …………………………………………………………………….. 341 Ann Pilcher Dayton ‘Builders of the Temple of the New Civilisation’: Annie Besant and Freemasonry .................................................................................... 359 Andrew Prescott Diversity In Unity? Background and History of the Different Masonic Traditions Within the Craft Lodges of the Dutch Federation of the International Order of Mixed Freemasonry ‘Le Droit Humain’ ..... 393 Anne van Marion-Weijer Index of Orders and Lodges ............................................................ 425 Index of Names ............................................................................... 429 PREFACE Much has changed since in 1986 John Hamill1 showed that the hith- erto generally accepted theory about the origin and early history of Freemasonry, first formulated by such scholars as Gould in the 1880s, could not be maintained when the facts available were analysed anew from a modern scholarly perspective. Since then, scholars have redis- covered the archives and found many documents which had previously been overlooked, or the significance of which had not been understood. This has led to important new insights, often radically con- tradictory to those which had been previously assumed.2 Generally, we now tend to assume that the so called speculative form of freemasonry—the ‘speculating’ (philosophising) about possible symbolical interpretations of the working tools of a freestone mason, of his ‘craft’ in general, of what he is working at, etc.—was part and parcel of the training of craftsmen, long before the so called ‘Premier Grand Lodge’ was formed in 1717, and even before the Schaw Statutes were written in 1598 and 1599. Thus, what changed in the early 18th century was not that ‘gentlemen masons’ introduced this aspect, but rather that fewer and fewer craftsmen were members of the lodges, so that the ‘operative’ aspect was gradually lost. Also, there never existed a fixed form of what ‘true’ or ‘authentic’ freemasonry once was. Rather, it constantly developed and develops, changing its form all the time, in different ways in different times and places, sometimes very radically. Finally, from a scholarly perspective, there never existed ‘bad’, ‘devi- ant’ forms of freemasonry (as in the past such systems as Cagliostro’s ‘Egyptian Rite’, Von Hund’s ‘Strict Observance’ and Weishaupt’s ‘Illuminati’ have been qualified), but just forms which were successful and those which were not (which is not necessarily a criterion of qual- ity, measured according to ritual theories). Also, the number of scholars—historians and sociologists, mainly—who are not freemasons but are nevertheless of the opinion that freemasonry had such an impact on the development of the West- 1 Hamill 1986, chapter 1: “Theories of Origin”: “Whilst the approach of writers of the authentic school has the appearance of scientific research their methods were not what we would accept as scientific today.” (17); “Despite this lack of substantiation the authentic school ... constructed the operative-transitional-speculative theory of the origins of Freemasonry” (19). 2 Just a few examples must suffice here: Bernheim 1998; Stevenson 2002; Noël 2002; Scanlan: 2004. viii J.A.M. SNOEK ern culture, that this development cannot be understood without pay- ing due attention to the role of freemasonry, has increased signifi- cantly.3 As a result, the study of freemasonry has become part and parcel of the academic enterprise, even creating a few chairs and insti- tutes dedicated to the subject.4 Today, scholars who are also freemasons, and those who are not, cooperate harmoniously and critically in mutually complementing ways. With the exception of France, this development has so far given rise to very few new books about freemasonry, written from the new perspective.5 This is the case for nearly all aspects of freemasonry which have been or should be inves- tigated, including the relationship between women and freemasonry, which has been traditionally regarded as a purely male phenomenon. Significant research in this area has been done over the past two dec- ades, again, especially in France.6 But very little of the new insights have been made available in English.7 This volume aims to be a first step in filling that gap. Women have been structurally part of the masonic enterprise from at least the middle of the 18th century. Over time, widely different forms of their participation developed and spread world-wide. The number of Rites (i.e. ritual systems), adapted to, or even developed specifically for them, is large. Yet, little is known about the ways in which they themselves obtained and exercised power to influence the systems they were involved in, in order to adapt them to be more appropriate to their needs, let alone how and to what extent they used their membership as a means of influencing the larger social context they lived in. This development should not be viewed independently of the larger historical developments, including those concerning the place of women in their cultures. The subject, therefore, is vast; re- searching it has hardly started, and yet, even today there is already so much to say about it that no single volume could claim to cover it 3 Foremost among them Margaret C. Jacob (UCLA) and Monika Neugebauer-Wölk (University of Halle, Germany). 4 Such as the Centre for Research into Freemasonry at the University of Sheffield, UK, of which Andreas Önnerfors is currently the director, and the Chair for the study of Freemasonry at the University of Leiden, The Netherlands, which is currently held by Malcolm Davies. 5 Again

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